


it would be a hundred times easier

by paaxanthus



Category: Half-Life
Genre: Angst, Emotional Hurt, Hurt No Comfort, They/Them Pronouns for Gordon Freeman
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-16
Updated: 2020-07-16
Packaged: 2021-03-04 21:47:30
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 275
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25313329
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/paaxanthus/pseuds/paaxanthus
Summary: Alyx's questions lead to Barney thinking about how much he misses his (presumably dead) partner.
Relationships: Barney Calhoun/Gordon Freeman
Kudos: 63





	it would be a hundred times easier

Barney _knew_ why he was always throwing himself headfirst into danger for the sake of the resistance. Hell, everyone who had known him for years had at least some idea. It was better left unspoken. Better to _not_ poke a raw, festering wound.

So her innocent request of “hey, Uncle Barn, tell me about the One Free Man,” touched on a sore subject, but he had still shared some silly, pre-apocalyptic story of racing through the vents to unlock Kleiner’s office. For her, for now, anything related to them would be grand stories of hopes and dreams.

Now, with everyone else asleep, Barney was alone with his thoughts. 

Which, of course, kept circling back to how much he missed _them_.

He would give _anything_ to be able to wake up back in the security dorms at Black Mesa, to patrol the chilly, winding hallways of Sector C, to spend his lunch break lost in one of their hyperfixation-related tangents. To wake up in Gordon’s dorm on a Sunday afternoon, seeing their mess of wavy brown hair sticking out in every direction across the pillows as they woke up, too.

It was wishful thinking at its finest.

Wishful, yes, but he would be damned if he wouldn’t let himself dream every once in a while. It was one of the very few things that kept him sane. The years since he’d last seen them hadn’t been kind to anyone.

The vortigaunts seemed insistent that Gordon would be back, _someday_. That Barney would, in fact, see them again. Barney had lost hope of that actually happening a long time ago.

For now, he would let himself sleep.

**Author's Note:**

> half a decade into post-apocalyptic hell world and your niece asks you about your partner you still aren't over. wyd?   
> was listening to two slow dancers by mitski and decided i was going to be fucked up and evil. this one goes out to mars for encouraging me to be evil


End file.
